Singe, er, Ultimate-Mellow, Man: Buford vs. Brockmeier

"Heat," by Bill Buford
Data dump:
Manly editor godhead quits his lucrative job to "kitchen bitch" it in one of New York City's precious 3-star (that's ***) restaurants and then travels to Italy to learn how to get a dead pig into his NYC apartment so he can hack it up.
Petty jealousy:
Witty, frothy, brisk read that's well worth it, baring the 15-page-long endurance tests on how everything I cook is garbage because I stir clockwise instead of counterclockwise; and that the meaning of life can be found in polentta, was it?
What I meant to say:
- The New York Times
- Guardian Books
- London Review of Books


"The Brief History of the Dead," by Kevin Brockmeier
Where it's at:
Uber-talented short-story writer pens a multi-perspective tale about memory and what happens to you when you die; indicts Coke along the way and mysteriously dodges a lawsuit.
Ill-information:
Not sure what the moral of this lonely ghost story is but Catholics will dig the purgatory (which resembles coffee hour at St. John's but a bit more Capra-esque), and the scenes taking place in Antarctica are surprisingly believable (if you've seen "March of the Penguins").
Yeah, what they said:
- Salon
- January Magazine
- Slate